The former Perkins restaurant building on Third Street in south Bethlehem has sat lifeless since July 2010.

For weeks, the vacant space has been rumored to become Perkins again.

The rumors are correct: Perkins is reopening soon, according to Joe Kelly, Bethlehem's community and economic development director.

A reopening date was not immediately known. Phone calls and emails to Perkins spokeswoman Vivian Brooks were not returned Monday afternoon.

Brooks has declined to say why the Perkins closed in 2010, only saying that there's "a lot of criteria to consider when closing a restaurant."

The restaurant opened in 2000 and had been popular with Lehigh University students.

The restaurant's reopening gives a bit of good news for Perkins, the family restaurant chain that emerged from bankruptcy protection last year, but not before shuttering dozens of its roughly 600 locations due to reduced consumer spending and higher costs for ingredients such as sugar and eggs.

In recent years, the company also closed locations in the Lehigh Shopping Center on Union Boulevard in wes Bethlehem and Third Street in Easton.

I sure hope they won't be putting back up that ridiculously humungous sign. Talk about overkill.

Posted By: voxpop1 | Apr 2, 2012 9:18:47 PM

Leave A Comment

NOTE: Please express your opinions in a civil and respectful manner. Insensitive, inflammatory and derogatory comments will be removed at our discretion.

Name:

Email:

URL:

Comments:

Remember My Info

ABOUT THIS BLOG

Tyrone Richardson is a business reporter at The Morning Call. In this blog, he keeps tabs on the latest developments in the Lehigh Valley retail scene, from the opening of a new, trendy restaurant to the closing of a well-established clothing store. Also a bit of a cheapskate, Tyrone writes about special deals and sales when he stumbles upon them. The blog is a companion to his Retail Watch column, published every Sunday in The Morning Call.